I recently received this light from Banggood.
It caught my eye because the styling was clean and simple and it was a XP-G2 light for $4.99. That’s right, $4.99 ($4.59 with BLF code). A few days after I ordered it Bangood more than trebled the price to the current $17.58. 
It wasn’t a flash sale or special deal, $4.99 was the regular price and had been for several weeks. So I started out reviewing a $5 light but had to re-think my conclusions in light of the new price. So, is it worth $17.58?
In a word, No.
Not least because despite what it says on Banggood, and on the box, and in the manual (yes, a manual - in English!), the LED is NOT XP-G2 but XP-E2. |(
Thorfire clearly don’t know their Gs from their Es. I have contacted Banggood about this and await a reply.
The light itself is more or less identical to the Palight V5 that was reviewed by Pregulla a couple of years ago, so that review pretty well covers this light as well.
I’m beginning to suspect that there are actually only a handful of torch manufacturers in China, each churning out several different brands. The box, manual and the light itself are branded Thorfire but all warranty issues and enquiries are directed to eachine.com. The tail switch is branded Palight, the driver is branded Luckysun whilst the LED gasket and switch cap are branded Nico. The overall impression is a light that has been cobbled together from the spare parts bin.
The manual states that the driver is 5 mode, but like other Luckysun drivers it’s actually 6 mode with turbo sandwiched between strobe and sos, and no memory. Yuk. :Sp
There’s PWM in all modes except turbo but thankfully the frequency is high and it’s not really noticeable.
OK, simple enough job to swap out the driver, right? Well, actually no. The driver is held in by a brass ring but it’s not threaded, just a very very tight push fit and so far it has resisted all my attempts to shift it.
(For photos see Pregulla’s review and customer photos on Banggood.)
Likewise you’ll notice the lack of a tail cap - the switch housing also seems to be a very tight push fit into the end of the body with no obvious means of extraction other than attacking it with a 2lb hammer (and we all know how that’s going to end). The button surround has been left as bare aluminium which, to my eyes, rather cheapens the appearance of the tail end. It looks like they missed a bit with the anodizing. The switch itself has a rather strong spring, making it hard to press and very noisy. Sounds and feels cheap.
Otherwise the finish is good and a nice gunmetal grey rather than the usual black. No clip or lanyard are supplied.
So, any other good points? Yes. It’s very bright on turbo and if you like throwers, you will like this light. The hotspot is sharply focused and just keeps on going and going. The beam is pencil-thin up close though. In misty conditions it’s like walking around with a lightsaber.
The body threads are anodized so the switch can be locked out by a quarter turn of the head. You can also use the head as a twisty switch to change modes and turn it on and off. With a light this size this actually works very well and is much quicker and easier than using the tail switch (a lot quieter too!)
Conclusion: At the original price of $5 it’s excellent value, even with the wrong emitter. At $17? Unless you just love the minimalist styling, no way, there are much better lights out there for that sort of money.
